You know things are getting pretty tough out there when you see more than 20 vendors band together to urge the Federal Communications Communication to speed up its approval of a merger which effectively reduces, by a large degree, the potential customer base of every one of those vendors.

That's exactly what 22 vendors did last week, fearing that the FCC's final vote on the AT&T-BellSouth deal will linger into next year. As it stands, FCC approval could come next week, but that's no sure thing.

The vendors are afraid that delaying the vote again could lead to many more delays if the Democrat-controlled Congress (there's a phrase that takes some getting used to...) decides to pick at the deal a bit. There's even the possibility that the merger may not get approved--a possibility we all would have considerable laughable months ago.

The fact that so many companies are bent on seeing this deal go through as soon as possible shows you how far industry consolidation has come. Vendors themselves have consolidated to match the scale of larger customers, and the whole industry has rapidly moved to an economic model of fewer, larger vendors chasing fewer, larger contracts. All of the smaller partners of those vendors are desperately waiting to feed on whatever piece of the business the bigger companies regurgitate for them.

Meanwhile, everyone knows that if sales slip for even a quarter, punishment from Wall Street is imminent. That further perceived weakness could begin to build the case for a sluggish telecom industry economy, and then we all start to feel the pain.

Sure, if BellSouth remains independent for some reason, that's one more customer and more contracts to pursue, but a nerve-wracked industry clearly believes there's no chance of that, and moreover, that the additional pain it would need to endure to find out would be unbearable. How quickly we've adjusted to our new reality.

E-mail me at doshea@telephonyonline.com.